Browser password management is horribly insecure and a prime target for malware. They also don’t offer secure password generation, multifactor authentication, etc etc etc. It’s not necessary to engage with the full range of features things like LastPass offer but I highly recommend at least using them for the stuff you currently have Chrome do.

Crap… while I do use Lastpass and Keepass, there were times I save some passwords on Safari iCloud Keychain for the convenience of having my password on the mobile phone. Is iCloud Keychain a bad idea as well?

That’s actually a bit dated and only applies to Chrome’s built-in password management. A bit under a year ago they introduced Smart Lock, which stores all your passwords online in your Google account.

This is much more secure, but doesn’t support secure password generation (which is a huge deal), only works in Chrome browser, doesn’t have customizable log-out options so your Chrome browser probably stays logged in to your Google account all the time, and only stores browser passwords, unlike Lastpass which allows you to store arbitrary text in secure notes. It’s only as secure as your Google account, which can be quite secure if you turn on 2-factor authentication and are careful, but for most people really isn’t.

So it’s not really a complete password solution comparable to Lastpass, 1Password, or KeePass, but it is much better than storing passwords in a text file on your desktop or memorizing one password and using it everywhere.

Subscribers get “priority customer support, family password sharing with up to 5 others, and additional two-factor authentication options like YubiKey. You can also safeguard important documents with 1GB of encrypted file storage.”

Note the premium card says “ad free”. So they are probably going to do that in the free version. But I’m sure that’s only inside the application, not injected into websites so again… don’t care. On desktop I’ll block the ads, on mobile I’ll deal with it.

Curious if 1password responds to this. They were always a much more expensive option and now are dramatically so.

Curious if 1password responds to this. They were always a much more expensive option and now are dramatically so.

I have a family plan with them and share it with my wife. For $5/month, it’s free on all platforms, has a nice web interface, good browser integration, etc. It’s a great solution for us. I really like the AgileBits team.

They got bought by a bigger company, so this is probably a play for more customers. It’s a competitive space; if they get big enough, they’ll probably want to be bought by an even bigger company. They’ll make their money on ads, or if you want to pay for Premium. I already bought two years a year ago, so I’ll be coasting on Premium for a while.